Dear Dave

  Catching up

Dear Dave,

You're right, I haven't really told you what happened in the end about all the repairs from the flood damage. I was waiting until the tradesmen were finished. They've been almost finished for a month now, however.

All they have to do is make the towel rail in the bathroom work again, except they've had to 'order a part over the internet from a foreign gas supplier'. I should really phone them and chase it up but, after months of chaos, it's nice not having tradesmen in the house. Also, although it's getting pretty chilly stepping out of the shower in the morning, I'm nervous of what else they might break in trying to fix the problem. There's something to be said for quitting while you're not too far behind.

Our insurers cheered us up the other day, however. Seemingly unaware that we're already their customers, they sent us some junk mail encouraging us to sign up with them. Their big selling point was that their call-centre staff are polite, professional and always phone back when they say they will.

How we laughed...

At least the decorating is done and, after much effort, most of our furniture and stuff is back where it should be. My safe place is reinstated, the replacement Xbox 360 is set up and I managed to trade-in my temporary one for pretty much what I paid for it. Result. Thanks to all the sorting out, I haven't had much time to actually spend in the safe place, but it's good to know it's there.

On another happy note, the mice have mysteriously gone away. No more have leapt at me out of household appliances. One day they were high-diving down the stairs and hiding amongst shoes, the next day they had vanished. There was that dopey one I caught a week later but, since then, I haven't spotted any evidence of them. Not a sign. Maybe they were coming in from next door and the repairs there blocked up the access hole. Or maybe, as soon as I'd closed down the toaster buffet, they simply had no reason to come to our house.

The second explanation begs the question of how often they'd been snacking in the crumb tray before I caught one in the act.

Excuse me a moment whilst I go scrub the worktops with bleach one last time...

Anyway, we bought a new toaster and we're going through twice as much sliced bread as normal thanks to the novelty value of being able to slightly char it again. I keep a lid on the toaster when we're not using it, though.

Marie went with Sarah on the shopping trip to buy the toaster and was very excited when they got back. "We bought a toaster!" she shrieked, showing me the box. "This one didn't have mice in." She seemed to believe that the other ones in the shop came with the mice presupplied. I didn't correct her. After all, I'm now a man who keeps a lid on his toaster and views open toasters with paranoid suspicion. Who am I to judge what's crazy?

Speaking of paranoia, I did find a mouse dropping in the middle of the lounge carpet a couple of days ago. I assume it came out from under the TV cabinet when I was faffing with wires to try and fix our wireless router (oh, the irony) but it did cause me to panic at the prospect that there had been some fresh scouting by the rodents. Our stricter than normal hygiene rules will remain for a while longer yet. I suspect they will continue to be ignored, though:

Marie and I were sitting upstairs in the lounge the other evening and she suddenly went, 'A crumb!" and picked something off her sleeve. It had been a little while since tea and I didn't get a good look at whatever it was so I was going to tell her not to eat it. But, of course, I was too late. She popped it in her mouth and smiled happily. I shrugged. What can you do? I was going to give her a lecture but then I looked down and noticed a crumb on my own shirt. Without thinking, I picked it up, popped it in my mouth and smiled happily. I think it was toast but I didn't really take a good look at it. You know, it had been a while since tea, and I was feeling a little hungry, and it was probably toast and...

I decided to hold off on the lecture. I felt I'd lost the moral high ground.

There's only so much conflict that I can take, anyway. Earlier in the day she'd asked to watch some Winnie the Pooh. Now, we have Bob the Builder, Tweenies, Teletubbies, Bagpuss, most of Pixar's ouput, Tom & Jerry, Numberjacks, Scooby-Doo, Fimbles, Thomas the Tank-Engine, Barney, Shrek, the adventures of various Disney princesses, Mr Men and goodness knows what else but we don't have any Winnie the Pooh.

"We don't have any Winnie the Pooh," I said. "What do you want to watch instead."

"I want watch Winnie the Pooh instead," she said excitedly.

"We don't have any. You can't watch something we haven't got. You'll have to watch something else. How about Tweenies? Do you want to watch Tweenies?"

She pulled a face. "No! I don't want watch Tweenies."

"How about Bob?" I suggested. "Would you like to watch Bob the Builder?"

"No. I not like that."

"OK. How about...?" I made various suggestions. She refused all of them. Things went on like this for some time.

"How about Little Mermaid?" I asked finally, approaching the end of my tether.

"No," she said emphatically

I gave up. "OK. Tell me what you want to watch then."

"I want to watch..." She paused, knowing I might not take kindly to her asking for Winnie the Pooh again. Then she had an idea. "I want watch something we don't have."

I wasn't fooled. This was obviously just a way of informing me she wanted the bear of very little brain without actually saying the name. "How's that going to work?" I snapped. "Tell me something that we have that you want to watch."

It was too late.

"I want watch something we don't have," she said again but she now seemed quite taken by the concept. At that point, I knew that even if I suddenly found some Winnie the Pooh, it would no longer suffice. I was sure that the moment I produced 'something that we didn't have', it would become something else - it would become 'something we hadn't had until recently'. That wasn't going to cut it. She had her heart set on a logical impossibility. She wanted to not have her cake and eat it.

So, of course, she got nothing. She got to sit and glumly stare at a blank screen for an hour, every so often whining miserably, "I want something we don't have."

It wasn't much fun for anyone but eventually she said, "I want Party Rings now. They make me happy." I gave her the biscuits and, sure enough, she was happy again.

If only that worked on adults...

Hang on, maybe it does work. Things aren't so bad now but there's no harm in doing a little experimentation in preparation for the next time the house falls apart. Excuse me while I head over to the biscuit tin to conduct some research...

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: children, flood, mice

  9:00 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Mice, yaks, tradesmen and a shovel

Dear Dave,

If there's one thing I hate about this job, then it's dealing with tradesmen. Honestly, I'd rather clean up vomit.

Erm, not that I'm making a direct comparison here. You know, like they both smell bad and leave a mess on your carpet. All I mean is that both things are on my list of normal duties and, if you arranged the list by ordered of preference, then dealing with tradesmen is at the bottom. Thus, there are any number of things I'd rather do, from making packed-lunches to standing outside school in the rain to watching the same episode of the Tweenies over and over again until their irritating voices buzz constantly inside my head and I feel the urge to take a large magnet to their animatronics while rubbing chewing gum into their fur. Heck, I'd probably even rather buy clothes than deal with tradesmen.

Considering I only have one pair of shoes and I still regularly wear a shirt I bought when I was at secondary school, that's saying something.

The problem is, I'm just no good at it. I can't seem to get them to turn up on the day they've promised, persuade them to do the work exactly as I want or inspire them to ever entirely finish the job to my satisfaction. Any tradesman I've found who I have managed to bend to my will has gone bust before I need their services again. (That or been replaced by their Porsche driving offspring who do a job that's not quite as good for twice as much money). Coordinating repairs to the flood damage from next door has gone particularly badly because it's my insurers who are paying for the work to be done so I have absolutely no hold over the company doing the work at all. If I have a complaint, I phone the insurers. After three days of trying, I get through to the person in charge of my case. He emails the plumbers. The plumbers don't reply. My radiators remain upside down. I have to go murder some Tweenies to vent my frustration and then I phone the insurers again. The cycle continues...

Things are finally progressing, however, albeit slowly. The other morning, a decorator was busily re-painting a ceiling on the top floor (the damage was on the ground floor of our three storey house) while refusing to touch up the skirting board on the first flight of stairs (mere inches from where a big patch of plaster had had to be replaced). Meanwhile, a plumber was happily removing parts of the central heating (again) but wasn't really committing to a definite timeframe for putting them back. He was also fairly reticent on whether they'd be the right way up.

Hey, at least something was happening, which made a change.

The doorbell rang in the midst of the chaos. It was Steve, Sarah's manager, and I was taken by surprise. We hadn't arranged to meet up and get the kids together. He didn't even have his kids with him. He was dressed for work but, obviously, he wasn't at work. He was neither being Useless Dad nor Clueless Manager and, thus, he was dangerously out of context. I stood and gaped at him.

"Is this a good time?" he said.

"Erm..." I had two tradesmen in the house, Marie was having a strop and I had a live mouse in my hands. I couldn't help feeling that this was stretching the definition of 'a good time.' As if to emphasise the point, there was a clang behind me, the sound of liquid escaping under pressure and muttered swearing. There was an almost desperate, pleading look in Steve's eyes, however. "Erm..." I repeated.

"Good God, what's that?" said Steve, suddenly noticing what I was carrying.

"It's a mouse." It was crouched under a glass bowl which I was pressing down on a thin sheet of cardboard. "I caught it."

"What are you going to do with it?"

"Well, when I catch spiders like this, I normally chuck them out the window. They're less squishy, though. Want to take it home for your cat?"

"Not really."

"Thought not. That leaves three options: let it go to die a lingering death from the poison it's almost certainly eaten, leave it under the bowl and watch it die a lingering death from the poison it's almost certainly eaten, or hit it over the head with a shovel."

"The first two don't sound that good."

"Shovel it is, then." I stepped out on the driveway, put my impromptu trap down and fetched a heavy digging implement. "Right, you lift the bowl and I'll whack it."

"That's a very big shovel for a very small mouse," said Steve, not entirely sure.

"It's the only shovel I have," I replied, losing it slightly. "They don't sell them in sets like they do with knives - you know, big shovel for allotments, medium shovel for flowerbeds, little shovel for window boxes and miniature shovel for mouse whacking. I have one shovel for all eventualities. What do you want me to do? Brain it with a teaspoon?"

"This isn't a very good time, is it?"

"No, it's not. Now lift the bowl so I can put Mickey out of his misery."

"All right." He very gingerly lifted the bowl. The mouse didn't move. "Are you sure it isn't dead alr..." He jumped back as I swung the shovel down with a thunk. "OK, it's really dead now."

I peered at it closely. "Yep, it's definitely not going to re-route its internal circuitry to its secondary power source and relentlessly hunt us down through a metal-pressing factory."

Steve looked at me blankly.

"Er, never mind," I said. I scooped the mouse into a plastic bag and binned it. Ridding the house of at least one rodent had eased some of my frustration. I felt able to deal with tradesmen once more. It had even been something of a bonding experience with Steve. "Sorry I was a bit short with you just now - it's been a difficult week. Want to come in for a coffee?"

"If you're sure...?"

"It'll be fine. Just try not to trip over the remains of the heating."

I led him through to the kitchen. The boys were at school but Marie was face down on the floor, screaming, because I'd mixed her yogurt in with her Rice Crispies for her. I'd then tried to make things better by offering to eat the Crispies myself and get her fresh ingredients but no - she wanted the same Crispies and yogurt, not similar ones. She wanted me to miraculously unmix them, solely in order for her to mix them herself. Strangely, I'd refused. She'd been crying for an hour. I guess she's just reached that stage... I motioned for Steve to ignore her and take a seat at the table. I washed my hands two or three times and then made refreshments.

"Now, what can I do for you?" I said to Steve, plonking his coffee down in front of him.

He looked uncertainly at Marie. "Is she all right?"

"She'll get over it." I picked up her bowl and offered it to Steve. "Would you like some Rice Crispies and yogurt?"

"No!" Marie screamed. "They mine! They mine! He not eat them!"

"Well, you'd better eat them quickly then, Marie, before he does."

"OK!" She leapt up from the floor and hurried to her seat in a panic, brushing her hair out of her face as she went. She snatched her bowl from my hand and hugged it close. "My Crispies... Mine."

I put on her favourite Scooby Doo episode with the sound down low and turned back to Steve. "Yeah, so what can I do for you?"

"Scott's been re-assigned," he said, dejectedly.

I was taken by surprise again. Being Steve's manager, Scott was pretty senior and so there weren't many opportunities for lateral movement in the org chart. Also, having met him a couple of times, I couldn't imagine which division of LBO would actually want him. "Where have they re-assigned him to? Pensions? Life Assurance?"

"Ulan Bator."

"Oohh..." I sucked in air between my teeth. "Do they play rugby in Mongolia? He can't be happy."

"They called him in, late yesterday, and told him to pack his suitcase. Didn't give him a chance to appeal. They said that, after careful consideration, he was the best man to explore new business opportunities in an expanding financial market that required hard-nosed negotiation and the ability to wrestle a yak. They didn't even give him time to tell anyone. He's on the plane already and I only found out because his replacement wants to see me."

My worst fears were calmed. For an awful few seconds, I thought he was going to say that he'd been promoted to fill Scott's parking space. No wonder he was upset - being Scott's favourite sycophantic minion had all but assured Steve's immunity to the job cuts and restructuring. "Who's his replacement then?"

"Morag Chandler. She's an awful woman. She's not even from the Communications Division. She's from IT! She got called in at the last minute a couple of weeks ago to arbitrate at one of the redundancy consultations, argued with everything Scott said and suddenly thinks she can do better. I'd heard she'd gone to the board to complain but I can't believe they even listened to her. It was only by chance she was at the meeting and now she's in charge. I don't understand it."

"Mmmm, yeah," I said, chewing my lip. I was slightly miffed that he didn't remember that it was my wife's redundancy consultation that Morag had attended. He seemed to have forgotten that he'd put her job forward for the chop and that, thanks to him, her career still hung in the balance. I resisted pointing out my lack of sympathy, however, since it might have accidentally emerged that I was more than a little responsible for Morag entering his life. "Any idea what she wants to talk to you about? I mean, presumably she just wants you to get her up to speed on everything that's happening in your department."

"Most of my network access has stopped working and my company credit card just got refused."

"Ah."

"What am I going to do?"

"I, erm..." Something about the situation began to trouble me. "Does Deborah know?"

"No, I haven't told anyone yet. I don't know what to do."

My suspicion was confirmed. Somewhere between helping him change a nappy and inviting him round to play Wii Sports, I'd been promoted to close friend. I was possibly his only friend outside of work and of the network of business contacts he had attained playing golf and squash. If he lost his job, those other friends might disappear and there was no way that Deborah was going to let him mooch around their flat. I might become his only friend, full stop, and he was bound to turn up at my house every day to do his mooching, probably with his kids along so I could 'help' take care of them.

After a couple of years of wishing a 'career readjustment' on him, I unexpectedly found myself not so sure. I knew it would be pleasant for Sarah to get a manager with more of a clue and that that would have trickle-down pleasantness effects for me but...

I sighed. Maybe I was jumping too far ahead. Maybe he wasn't going to lose his job. Maybe...

I offered him a consoling chocolate digestive. For the first time, I took in how abnormally crumpled and defeated he appeared. In his mind, there was no maybe. He had the look of a doomed man and, suddenly, I couldn't help thinking that he'd stolen it from me. I knew I was going to have to start buying biscuits in double quantities.

"It's not so bad," I said. "I hear Deborah's interior design work is really getting going again."

He shook his head. "There's plenty of interest but she doesn't have the time."

"But if she didn't have to look after the children..."

"Once you've taken into account the cost of childcare, she wouldn't make enough for us to live on. Do you know how much nurseries cost?"

"Well, erm, if you did happen to, er, not be working, you could look after Ophelia and Josquin."

"Me? But..." Fear crossed his face. "All the time?"

"Yeah."

"But wouldn't they need fed and..." He seemed to ponder what else children might require but came up blank. "...things."

"Yep, they'd definitely need fed and, erm, 'things', but you could do that."

"I don't have the..." He indicated his chest. "...things."

"Ophelia's nearly four. Those things are no longer a feeding requirement. Fresh fruit, cheese sandwiches and sausages should keep her going, though. You could probably manage that."

"Every day?"

"You might want to vary the menu on occasion but I'm sure you could manage every day, yes. You can make cheese sandwiches, right?"

He was staring into space. "Deborah normally makes my sandwiches."

I decided to lay off on my housedad evangelism. He didn't appear ready to consider the future carefully. He just needed a little reassurance. "I tell you what - go into work and chat to Morag and find out what the score really is. Maybe there's been a misunderstanding or there's some kind of challenging new opportunity waiting to develop your career that she hasn't told you about. You never know. If the worst comes to the worst, though, you can polish up your CV and start phoning round your contacts. There's a long way to go yet."

He didn't seem to hear me. "Maybe..." he muttered and then looked at his watch. "Is that the time? I've got to get to work to see Morag. Maybe I can convince her to let me help Scott in Ulan Bator. I could learn to wrestle yaks."

"Sure you can," I said and handed him his coat. "It's getting the yak into the spandex that's the tricky part."

He definitely wasn't listening. "Yes," he said, slightly vacantly. "Yes, there's a long way to go yet..." I showed him to the door.

"Are you going to be all right?" I asked, somewhat concerned. He really wasn't all there.

"Mmmm? Yes, I'll be fine. Everything's going to be fine."

"OK. Well, take care. Bye."

He'd already wandered off down the drive in a daze. I watched him along the street for a while, just to make sure he didn't walk into a lamp post or anything, and then I went back to the kitchen.

Marie had cheered up. "I eat all my Crispies. I have dessert now!"

"You don't get dessert at breakfast," I said.

"Awwww," she whined. "I want chocolate biscuit." She pointed at the open packet on the table. "You eat nine."

"I had more like three."

"You eat nine!" She folded her arms and hung her head stubbornly. Another tantrum seemed on the cards.

"Whatever," I said. She had a fair comment in there somewhere and teaching her to count using chocolate biscuits wasn't a route I wanted to follow. I relented. "Would you like one?"

"Yes!" She snatched it from me and grinned. "Thanks!"

I had another myself and we settled down to watch some Scooby Doo. The plumber broke a couple more things and left. The decorator went off to buy a paper and sit in his van doing sudoku while he worked up an appetite for lunch. I was past caring.

Half an hour later, I discovered Steve had left his briefcase behind. On checking, however, I found that it contained nothing but a couple of pens and his sandwiches. Either that was all he normally had in his briefcase or he had left home with it out of habit despite knowing his fate. Both options were slightly depressing.

While I was cheering myself up by eating the sandwiches, Sarah phoned. Steve had been made redundant. On the plus side (or, from Sarah's perspective, on the other plus side) she'd been promoted to take his place. (Technically, of course, this meant Steve was being summarily fired rather being made redundant but they'd offered him a settlement to go quietly). A pay rise, added benefits and the freedom to do the job properly - Sarah was ecstatic. I wasn't quite as enthusiastic as she'd expected so I had to explain about Steve's visit. She did her best to understand but, to be honest, her heart wasn't in it. Can't say I blame her - his management had made her life a misery on occasion.

We agreed to meet up for lunch to talk it over and celebrate.

As I gathered up coats and tried to get my head back on straight, I noticed that the painter had touched up the woodwork in the end. Oddly, this felt like the best news I'd had all day. My spirits immediately lifted. In some small way, I'd got a tradesman to do what I wanted. Even if Steve did start turning up every morning, at least the house was nearly fixed. I could cope.

I put Marie's shoes on her and we set off along the street. Sarah's promotion finally sank in - more money, more holiday and a happy wife. That had to be good. There were all kinds of possibilities...

Pretty soon, I was so busy dreaming of big tellies, I walked into a lamp post.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: corporate madness, flood, mice, Useless Dad

  11:00 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  One-dimensional eating habits

Dear Dave,

Thanks for the sympathy over all the things that aren't going entirely to plan just now. I know you have enough on your own plate to worry about at the moment. (Have you decided on any names!?) Sorry to hear Sam's acting up and refusing to eat anything which isn't long and thin. This does give you plenty of scope for nutrition, however - breadsticks, Cheestrings, carrots, chocolate fingers, crayons... There's a fairly long list of readily available foodstuffs and plenty of other things aren't too hard to cut into linear snacks. Obviously, you're going to be struggling with items like baked beans and peas and cake but I'm sure there must be ways round it. Mashing them up and squishing them together might work. Maybe not all at once but, you know, depends how much time you have...

Marie had a phase where she'd only eat doughnut-shaped food. This was much more awkward to accommodate. For a while she was made of Cheerios, Hula Hoops and Party Rings.

I should maybe just have given her the doughnuts and called her Homer.

Her Simpson-esque traits became even more apparent the other evening at the point I was getting her ready for bed. She was just annoyed and acting up about everything and I asked her if she was tired.

"No," she said, fighting her pyjamas as I tried to get them on her.

I wrestled one arm into her top. "Do you want to go to bed?"

"No!" she said, taking it off again.

"Are you sure?" I said, forcing the garment back over her head. "I think you need to lie down and get some sleep."

"NO!" she screamed and started to cry. She obviously and desperately needed some sleep but wasn't having any of it.

I was exasperated, frustrated and tired. I made the mistake of being sarcastic with a two-year-old. "What do you want to do then? Stay up all night and drink beer?"

She stopped. She looked at me. She jumped up and down excitedly. "Yes!"

"Er... I didn't really..."

"I not go to bed," she yelled, her body quivering with anticipation at the prospect of a six-pack, a sofa and a marathon of late night cable TV. "I not sleep. I drink beer!"

At which point Fraser and Lewis appeared from nowhere. "How come Marie's getting beer?" said Fraser.

"We want beer, too," said Lewis.

"Yes, can we have beer?" said Fraser.

Marie started running backwards and forwards, the length of the landing. "Want beeeeeeeeeeer! Want beeeeeeeeeer!" Then the boys joined in.

Needless to say, they didn't get any. But, by the time I'd finally got the whinging chancers off to bed, I did have a peculiar craving for a can of Tennents. Funny, that...

Anyway, as you've probably realised, I'm just avoiding talking about the stress in hand.

The mouse situation, at least, seems to be a little more under control now. I haven't actually seen any sign of one for a few days so it's possible they've gone away. Of course, I thought that with the ants, and you'll remember how that turned out. There's every chance that I've just managed to kill the stupid ones and that I'm using natural selection to breed a race of super rodents who will be able to avoid traps, open tins and steal the fridge. At the point they work out how to sell my stuff on ebay, I'm moving house.

The plumbing saga continues. Apparently out pipework is quite 'unusual'. (Translation: It was designed and implemented by a gibbon). The heating is now 88% fixed. Making it 100% fixed, however, may involve demolishing the bathroom.

As for Sarah... Well, things didn't go so well on Friday. LBO are laying people off left, right and centre. Branches are closing, work is being out-sourced, the final salary pension scheme is no more, services are facing the axe and the directors' bonuses have been linked to how much money they can lop off the operating budget. Not good.

Steve's still sitting pretty, as he predicted. Rob's department is gone but he's been shifted elsewhere. Technically, in terms of leadership and responsibility, it's a promotion. In terms of his annual salary, he's even had a pay rise. He was pretty pleased about that until I pointed out that the changes they've made to his holidays and working week mean his hourly rate has gone down. He's been sulking ever since.

Sarah has been made provisionally redundant. This means she has a couple of weeks to prepare and then she has to argue her case to be kept on with a special committee set up to give the impression that there has been some consultation with staff over all of this. It's already being called The Inquisition. Handily, each person will be interrogated by their manager and their manager's manager - i.e. the people instrumental in picking them for the chop in the first place. There will be an 'independent' member of senior management there from another division as well but I don't imagine that will be much comfort in most cases. Sarah's going to have to pull something pretty impressive out of the bag to make Steve and Scott perform a U-turn. (I'm thinking a bazooka would do it).

Ach, well, it isn't the first occasion something like this has happened and almost certainly won't be the last. We're coping as best we can. At least she isn't on maternity leave this time.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

PS Mmmmmmm... Doughnuts...

Labels: children, corporate madness, discrimination, flood, mice

  10:00 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Blunt, farce and trauma

Dear Dave,

My timing is as impeccable as ever.

As you'll recall, I am under obligation to encourage Sarah's manager, Steve, to be a more involved dad and it hasn't been going that well. He's too caught up in work and impressing his manager to really get the message. I think it's got to the point where I'm just not blunt enough for the task. Sure, I can nurture his parenting skills and bring him closer to his inner housedad, but he's going to have to want these things first. He needs to stop seeing his kids as an infestation of little people that his wife is dealing with. He needs a revelation.

Engineering those is notoriously difficult.

I considered various options from subliminal messaging on his iPod to fake memos from senior management. I even devised an overly-complicated plan involving a papier-mache angel, a searchlight and a burning PDA. These all seemed underhand, however (and too much like effort, to be honest). That said, I was tempted by the idea of giving him a near-death experience. Very tempted.

In the end, I decided my best bet was inviting Steve to one of the games nights at my house so he could meet my friend Mike. Mike is good at being blunt.

Unfortunately, I organised the get-together for last night. The big meeting at LBO where they're going to announce the redundancies is today. Obviously, I was somewhat tense about Sarah's job situation and when Rob turned up he was in a similar state over his own.

"You OK?" I said, showing him in and leading him up to the lounge.

"Nervous about tomorrow."

"What's the worst that can happen?"

"They fire me, I never work again, Kate dumps me, I have to live in a wheelie-bin and the Child Support Agency hunts me down with a pack of rabid dogs."

"You've been sitting in your cubicle thinking about that all week, haven't you?"

"Yep, it's not like they've given me any work to do. I've be... Aghh!" We were going upstairs and he gave a little shriek as a mouse nearly landed on his head, did a triple backflip with reverse twist and landed running in the hall. I pulled out some numerical fridge magnets from my back pocket and held up a 9.6. "What the...?"

I shrugged. "We have mice. I think they're practising for some kind of Festival performance. Just keep your shoes on and don't accept if anyone offers you any toast."

He nodded but looked even more nervous than he had before.

"Anyway," I said. "I thought you were trying to look busy completing a project that's already been cancelled."

"They out-sourced it to India."

"Er..."

"It's kind of like a trial run. They're testing communications and structures while making sure these guys can actually code. Time's cheaper over there, so LBO can waste more of it for less money."

"Yep, you're screwed," I said as we entered the lounge and I handed him a beer. "If it's any consolation, I'll look after your HD telly and PS3 to free up some space in that wheelie-bin."

"Not funny. How are Sarah's prospects?"

"The last time I saw her Head of Division, he was bright orange and swearing revenge."

"He can't hold losing at paintball against Sarah. She wasn't even playing."

"Scary Karen tied him to a tree and used a roller. He may not be entirely reasonable about things."

Rob grinned. "I'll find a really big wheelie-bin and you can share it with me."

"Thanks."

The doorbell rang. I left Rob setting up the Wii and hurried back downstairs. It was Steve.

The situation was somewhat awkward. Being head of Sarah's department, he knew whether she was going to be made redundant. Sarah had gone to her sister's for the evening to avoid him. I wittered as I took his coat and ushered him up to the lounge. I knew that he knew. He wasn't as abrupt as he usually is, which meant that he knew that I knew that he knew. Then he saw my quizzical expression, his face twitched and I knew that he knew that I knew that he knew that I knew that he knew. And my eyebrows must have raised because it looked like he knew that I...

"So is Sarah getting the sack, then?" asked Rob, as soon as we entered the room.

This refreshingly direct approach almost worked. "Ah, well, all the details are going to be announced tomorrow but I..." Then he recognised Rob. "You work in IT, don't you? You were one of the people that re-did the data analysis thingies last year. Bob, isn't it?"

"That's me," said Rob. "Are all the, er, thingies going OK?"

"Oh, yes. There are a couple of guys I know at a major insurance firm who are very jealous of the inverse customer retainment index calculator. The analysts still seem very pleased as well. It took them no time at all to get to grips with all the new bits and pieces. They just got on with the job as normal."

"Oh," I said, knowingly. "I'd forgotten you did that project for Steve."

Rob looked shifty. "Yeah. I had no end of problems, remember? I don't want to talk about it."

I nodded. Steve had read in a magazine about some 'amazing' software that had all kinds of functionality that sounded useful and had put in a request for extra options to be coded into the LBO marketing analysis tools. There were plenty of meetings but none of the people who actually used the tools wanted the new stuff. Sarah told Rob on the sly to just change the colour scheme and move some of the menus around. It was enough to convince Steve that Rob had done a years work in an afternoon and had the added bonus of not breaking any of the code in the process.

The doorbell rang again and I hurried to answer it. Steve was busy asking Rob if he still mentioned Star Wars at inappropriate times as I left the room.

"Steve here?" said Mike as I let him in. I'd already primed him with most of the details of my situation.

"Yep."

"Good." He headed up the stairs. A mouse flew past his ear and he blatted it out of the air with the back of his hand as it was performing a complicated figure-of-eight spin. It careened off the wall, hit the coat hooks and slid down into Rob's jacket pocket.

"You killed Boris!" I said in the middle of pulling out some numbers.

"He might just be stunned," said Mike. "If you want to take a look."

I thought about it. "Nah..." I said, shaking my head, and we continued to the lounge.

I did the introductions. "What do you do?" Steve asked Mike, clearly excited by the chance to network.

"You'd be surprised," said Mike. "It's usually a mixture of public speaking, management, social work, counselling and teaching."

"Really? Who do you work for?"

"Jesus," said Mike, offering Steve a beer.

"Oh." Steve looked at me and Rob to confirm that Mike wasn't having him on. Then he realised that he was trapped in a room with a computer geek, a housedad and a minister of religion. He took a couple of involuntary steps backwards.

I decided to make him feel at home. "Golf?" I said and handed him a wiimote. He looked at me like I was on drugs.

"I'll show him how to do it," said Mike, grabbing the controller.

"Make sure you've got the strap on tight," I said anxiously. "I've rearranged the room so you shouldn't be able to hit anything, but short, sharp movements are just as good as..." I was forced to duck as he took an enormous back swing and then dive out the way as he clubbed his virtual ball halfway to Mars. "...lethal arm-waving..." I muttered.

Steve was entranced, however. The prospect of being able to play golf without leaving the house had him hooked. He wanted to know all about the Wii and couldn't wait for a shot. I had visions of him running out first thing in the morning and buying one with a copy of Tiger Woods and then him never interacting with his family ever again. I'd made yet another error. My only hope was that he wouldn't be able to find the SCART socket on his telly.

As we played, we filled Mike in on the turmoil at LBO. At least, Rob and I did. Steve kept fairly quiet, interjecting only to occasionally defend senior management and their bold plan for the future. Even he didn't seem entirely clear what the plan was, though. Rob had a couple of beers and seemed to relax. He finally began to see the bright side...

"It's not as if I actually like the job, is it? I mean, it's OK, and everything. I get left alone to get on with stuff and the benefits are great but... What if there's something better? I haven't looked. There might be something I could really enjoy."

I nodded. "I hear Britney Spears is looking for a pet."

He appeared momentarily interested and then realised I was joking. "Seriously," he said. "I need to think about it now before... before..."

Mike sank a lengthy putt. "Before you become a dad, you forget what sleep is, you have no energy for change, risk begins to seem more risky and you start to smell slightly of used nappies?"

"Something like that," said Rob.

"Ach, get over it," said Mike. "There's always the possibility for change."

"It would be easier now, though," I added.

"I'm not denying that," said Mike, "but it's always worth working out what you'd do if you lost your job tomorrow - you never know when you might come up with a plan which is worth doing anyway. What are you going to do if they make you redundant, Steve?"

Steve gave a condescending smile as he tapped one in. "I've been assured that my position is safe."

"By your boss?" asked Mike.

"Yes. Scott and I have worked closely together on a number of projects," began Steve. "I feel that he values my contribution to..."

Mike cut him off. "Have you been completely straight with anyone who works for you?"

Steve grunted, shrugged, twitched and looked at me, all at the same time.

"Thought not," said Mike. "Best to at least consider the possibility, if I were you. Would getting fired make you happy or sad? Turn you numb or present you with an opportunity? What do you have outside work to hold onto. Where are you headed? Why are you going there in the first place? What's important? What's your purpose? Who are you and what do you want?"

Steve opened his mouth to answer.

"Heck," said Mike, "don't tell me. Do I look like I care?" He squared up for another big swing. "Tell your wife when you get home." He walloped the ball to within six inches of the hole. "And a fiver says I can beat you over the back nine."

Steve blinked and gaped and then remembered to breathe. Wisely, he declined the bet but he was somewhat shell-shocked for the rest of the evening. The conversation turned to lighter things - children, mice, incompetent plumbers and suitable pets for Britney Spears. We played golf a little longer, then moved on to some bowling. I made Rob and Mike toasties. Steve just had some toast. We finished off with a quick go at Mario Kart. I won (thanks to my many hours of being forced to play by Fraser) but Steve was surprisingly good despite his lack of gaming experience. Rob just kept complaining about the blue shells, as ever.

After that, people started to drift off, agreeing to meet up again soon. Steve went home looking pensive which, I guess, is about the best I could have hoped for. Rob left shortly after. I closed the door behind him and there was a muffled scream as he reached the end of the drive - doubtless at the moment he put his hands in his pockets.

Only Mike was left, seeming to take a while to put his coat on.

"Thanks," I said. "You gave Steve something to think about. I don't know if he will think about it, but it's better than I've done in several weeks."

Mike rubbed his chin and looked at me appraisingly. "What about you? I know your situation is different but what are you outside your job, Ed? You spend your whole time running around after small children. There's nothing more absorbing than that. What's going to happen when Marie starts nursery and you get some time to yourself?"

I started the mantra. "Not much - not in two hours a day, on weekdays, during term-time when all the kids are we..."

"You've told me that before," he said, frowning. "I'm not asking what you're going to do. I'm asking who you're going to be."

"I, er..."

"Yes, Steve is a pompous jerk but stick with him. He's going to be no more lost if he loses his job than you will be when all your kids are at school."

And with that, he was out the door. "See you on Sunday," he said and was gone.

It was my turn to be shell-shocked.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: blokesnight, computer games, corporate madness, housedad, mice, Useless Dad

  10:00 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  A rough week

Dear Dave,

There is a scene in the first episode of Desperate Housewives where the one with the riot of small children (Lynette) runs into a former colleague while attempting to buy groceries. This other woman asks Lynette how things are going and how she's finding being a housemom. Lynette has spent the last few minutes shouting at her children and behind her they are demolishing what little remains of the store. She obviously wants to reach over, grab the woman by the shoulders and shake her, screaming, "I can't take it any more. They're driving me insane! Please, help me! Please..." Instead, she forces a smile, says, "Best job I've ever had," and beats a hasty retreat.

There's a lot of truth there. It can be hard for parents to admit that they're not enjoying themselves. I know I have all kinds of fears - fear of being judged, of seeming ungrateful, of betraying my family or of being reported to social services (or, worse, to the wife). Maybe in my case there's even the fear of being pitied for being a man in a 'woman's job'. ("Well, what did you expect...")

This is, of course, nonsense. Whatever the job, we all have days, weeks and even years where the going is tough. It's perfectly fine to get some sympathy and support.

I am lucky enough to be able to honestly say that being a housedad is the best job I've ever had. Having said it, however, I have to admit that it's been a rough week.

We're back in our house but nothing much has been fixed. Despite moving us out for a week to a fancy apartment, the insurance company failed to authorise the contractors to actually do the work. The contractors agreed to get started as best they could anyway but weren't entirely sure what they were supposed to be doing. They decided the best thing to do was remove all the plumbing under the stairs. This allowed them to check more thoroughly for damp patches from the flood and to replace six floorboards which got destroyed during the many fruitless attempts to find the leak. Then they put the plumbing back.

Well, half of it.

The plumber broke something in the heating system and reckoned he needed to take it to a blacksmith for repairs. We got moved back because at least the cold water was on again and there was hot water from a ancient and very dubious immersion heater. Several days passed, however, and the plumber did not return. Then I noticed a bad smell from under the stairs.

Waste water was leaking liberally every time we flushed a toilet or emptied a sink. Gah!

I phoned the contractors and they sent round a different plumber. He fixed the leak but I've had to bail out my house again. As it happens, the first plumber had already been 'let go' before I phoned. The company had no idea our heating wasn't working. They should have a part by next week but, for crying out loud... And all for six floorboards. None of the plastering or redecorating's been done. We've missed our slot for the tradesmen now, so it will be a month before they can start but we've already cleared out the rooms involved.

Besides half the house falling apart and the other half being crammed full of stuff, the mice are taking up tap dancing behind the cooker. One did a double flip with twist past me down the stairs. I gave it an 8.5. I would have given it more but its landing was terrible. I just found another in the toaster. We've taken to shaking out our shoes before putting them on.

With all the disruption, Marie has gone from barely having a toilet accident to needing five pairs of pants a day. She also constantly refuses to do anything she's told.

All this, and Sarah's job uncertainty is getting to me too.

It's a little much.

I've had depression before. I know some of the warning signs. I haven't been sleeping well and I've been abnormally crotchety and lacking in energy. I started feeling drawn and just plain debilitated the other day. If you want to know what I mean, stand up, hold one arm straight out to the side and think happy thoughts for thirty seconds. Get someone to try and pull down your arm. Then do it again with the other arm but think about something which stresses you and gets you upset instead. You'll notice a difference. That's how I've been feeling for a couple of days.

Unexpectedly, the thing which really got to me was my dead Xbox 360. It was annoying it broke but Microsoft agreed to fix it for free and it should be back in a month or so. It shouldn't be a big deal. After all, I have other games machines to play and more games to play than I have time. It's an inconvenience, not a disaster.

But I found myself obsessing over it and ways to replace it. Could I borrow one? Hire one? Buy another one and trade it in later? Could I upgrade to an Elite version or find a really good deal on a Core? It was crazy. It wasn't even that I felt the need to play it. I just needed it to be in its normal place, ready to be played.

It was like I was going insane. I knew whatever plan I came up with was going to be a waste of money but I couldn't put the idea out of my head. According to any logical reasoning, buying another 360 was crazy. Somehow, though, I knew it would make me feel better in a way which went beyond fleeting retail therapy. Sarah saw a bargain in the window of a second-hand shop and I went and had a look, knowing full well I'd be unable to resist. My head swimming, I handed over my credit card, and then hurried home with my prize.

I've had the old one set up in a boxroom for over a year. I used to have a small table wedged in the corner next to the end of the changing unit (the head end, naturally) with a monitor on top and the Xbox underneath. The room has become the office more recently with a bit more space but everything's been cleared out of there for a couple of weeks to allow the repairs to be made.

As I moved the table back into place and started to set up the 'new' Xbox I began to feel happier and I realised what the problem had really been. I was missing my safe place. That little corner of the house is as far from everyone else as I can possibly get. It's cosy. It's always been free of mice. I've often gone there to play games and wind down late at night. It's my place to not worry. My place to hide. Putting it back together made me smile.

The weird thing is, I don't actually have to be in the safe place to feel better. I just need to know it's there. I got everything working, played a three minute game of Geometry Wars and then set about tidying the house. Everywhere is still in a state because of the water damage but it's tidier than it was. I can live with it and that's helped me feel better too.

Yep, it's been a rough week but I feel like I'm coping again. Sometimes the only way to stay sane is to admit you're a little crazy (whatever anyone else might think).

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

PS One of the great things about this job is that, even in the worst weeks, there's bound to be something to make you smile:

As we went down the vegetable aisle in the supermarket, Marie suddenly screamed, "I want broccoli!"

"We have broccoli at home," I replied.

"I want MORE broccoli!" she yelled.

"Er, OK," I said, hastily grabbing some and giving it to her.

She hugged the bag to her chest like a favourite teddy, rocking it. Then she sank back in the buggy and relaxed. "That's better," she sighed in relief.

Other parents looked on in awe as their children clutched packets of sweets. How on earth, they wondered, had I managed to raise a two-year-old who had a tantrum when not given green vegetables? For a brief moment, I was Super Dad.

I didn't make such a good impression, however, when the Primary 1 class emerged from school the other day, proudly carrying their first pieces of artwork. Lewis had produced this nice elephant:



Except, as he marched out, holding it high above his head and waving it, he had it the other way up:



"Which one's yours?" asked another parent whom I'd only just met. The answer was most of the way out of my mouth before I could stop myself.

"The one with the enormous green... erm... thing."

It was all just a little unfortunate...

Labels: children, depression, flood, housedad, mice

  10:00 AM - Permanent Link - 1 comments - Post comment - Links to this post

  Of mice and Mario

Dear Dave,

Most places it rains water. A few places it rains frogs. Very occasionally, in the American Midwest, it rains cows. We should be so lucky. There's a short season in Edinburgh - it only lasts from late July to the end of August - where local conditions combine with a light headwind to produce a most disconcerting meteorological phenomenon. It rains acrobats. It wouldn't be so bad but they're usually carrying sharp knives, flaming sticks or each other. Somebody's going to get hurt one of these days and, let's face it, it's probably going to be me. I'm usually so busy picking my way through the traders and tourists that I don't see the Super Mario Brothers tumbling towards me, and I can't hear them cursing each other in Italian because of yet another bagpipe rendition of Flower of Scotland blaring away right next to me. So I always end up getting a slice of experimental street-theatre in the face.

The Festival, don't you just love it?

Normally we're far enough from the centre of town for me to be able to avoid the worst of things but we've been moved out of the house while the flood damage is repaired. The insurance have put us in an apartment right next to the Parliament, close to the epicentre of the mayhem. We have to wade through a sea of foreign teenagers and people handing out flyers to get anywhere. It's madness.

(Other locals seem quite adept at phasing it out, however. You know it's the Festival when someone gets mugged despite carrying a broadsword).

The apartment that the insurance company have laid on for us is very swish but not enormously child-friendly. Everything is made of glass. Glass-topped dining tables are not much fun with children. The one here has sharp corners, clatters every time a piece of cutlery is moved and gets mucky the moment a child even looks at it. The only advantage is that when a kid drops some food, you can see exactly where it's gone. At least, you can until the view is obscured by all the fingerprints (and, as it turns out, footprints) on the under side of the table.

On the plus side, cleaners come in every day. This means the table doesn't get too grotty but having the toilet cleaned five times a week can't be good for our immune systems.

It is actually quite nice being away from home. Someone came round to our house and sprayed Something Really Nasty to get rid of the insects but, after the flood and the swarm of ants, our current plague is an infestation of mice. There was a small amount of evidence we had a problem when we came home from my parents, so I put out a couple of traps. Nothing happened for a few days. Then I caught the scrawniest mouse you have ever seen. There was much jubilation. I've never caught a mouse before - they usually just nick the cheese and do a runner. Using a bit of Mars bar as bait seemed to have done the trick. I was delighted.

I was less delighted when I caught another. Catching one mouse gives hope that the problem is solved. Catching two within an hour suggests that the problem is much bigger than first imagined. I've since caught another two. There's still skittering. All the food is in high cupboards or in tins so I'm not too worried but it's disconcerting sitting in the kitchen waiting for the little critters to sniff out one of my deadly surprises. Unfortunately, I can't use our office because all the furniture has been moved out to allow the walls to be repaired and decorated. So I sit typing at the table, surrounded by teetering piles of junk that have nowhere else to go, and wait for the SNAP! of a rodent needing burial.

I'm not desperate to get back.

On top of everything else, my Xbox 360 has been smited with the three red lights of death. I tried dusting it and letting it cool down and things like that but it's not just resting - it is an ex-console. Microsoft have agreed to fix it for free and emailed me a shipping slip but I have no idea when I'll get it back. Sarah has been reassuring me that she's certain Bill Gates is personally waiting with a soldering iron to receive my parcel from UPS and that I'll have my baby back soon. I, however, am aware of how many 360s have been going wrong. You know that scene at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark where the crate is wheeled into an endless warehouse filled with about a million very similar crates? That's more along the lines of what I'm thinking...

Ho, well, maybe things will be looking up next week - the kids are back at school and we should all have returned to our normal routines. There's going to be a big meeting at LBO, though, and there are mutterings of redundancies. Not good.

Right, the P1 class is only in until lunchtimes for the first few weeks, so I should wade off through the street performers to collect Lewis. I was late yesterday because Marie and I got ambushed by some very persistent mimes. Today, however, we should make better time.

I've fitted scythes to the buggy.

Yours in a woman's world,

Ed.

Labels: ants, Festival, flood, mice

  11:00 AM - Permanent Link - 0 comments - Post comment - Links to this post